David Cuffley Striker Chris Martin has admitted that fear of slipping back into the lower reaches of the Football League is one of the motivating factors behind his current scoring streak with Norwich City.

David Cuffley

Striker Chris Martin has admitted that fear of slipping back into the lower reaches of the Football League is one of the motivating factors behind his current scoring streak with Norwich City.

Martin scored for the third home game in a row to give the Canaries a 1-0 victory over Swindon Town and move them up to fifth place in League One.

It was the 20-year-old's fifth goal of the season since returning to Carrow Road from a year on loan at Luton Town.

And although he admitted he “enjoyed every minute” of his time at Kenilworth Road - which brought him 13 goals and Wembley success in the Johnstone's Paint Trophy, but relegation from the League - he has no desire to return to playing at that level.

“I think I learned a hell of a lot there and it can only help me, the experience that I had there, in my future career,” said Martin.

“And because I don't want to be back down there, it's an incentive to push on and drive on and keep going up the ladder rather than back down.

“It was my goal to do well down at Luton and push myself on so I could play here and be in the squad and it's turned out all right at the moment.

“I went through a hard time under a different manager here a couple of seasons ago and wasn't playing much and it's definitely turned itself on its head and I'm just happy to be playing and getting on the scoresheet.”

Martin struck from close range after half an hour against Swindon with an assist from Gary Doherty following Simon Lappin's corner.

“Doc has done brilliantly for me, to be fair, bringing it down and playing it with his left foot straight to me, and all I did was touch it and pop it in the bottom corner,” he said.

“Wes (Hoolahan) tried to flick it and I was just floating around in the box and luckily Doc had the quality to find me. I think he's underrated in that aspect of his game and I think he showed good quality with it.”

After scoring 11 times in their previous three home games, City failed to add to their lead, but seldom looked likely to let three points slip away.

“A second goal, I think, would have killed it off,” said Martin.

“We made it a little bit harder than perhaps we needed to by not getting the second, but I thought the lads showed great spirit. We didn't even look like conceding for most of the game and that's credit to the defensive lads.

“I think we are always going to cause other teams problems up front, which we did today, and I think we were unlucky not to get another.”

Martin hailed the victory as the perfect tonic after a stoppage-time goal condemned City to a 2-1 defeat at Leeds five days earlier.

He said: “We had a little talk about it and decided that we were the better team and we should take confidence from that. It was disappointing to go down the way that we did at Leeds on Monday but the best thing to do was come here and win, which we did.”

Manager Paul Lambert saluted Martin's knack of finding the net.

He said: “I think Chrissy Martin is probably one of the best finishers I've seen in a long time, whether it's from a free-kick or open play. He's got a terrific strike rate on him.

“He's only young, people tend to forget that.

“He's still a young lad who has a million things to learn, but the one thing about him - he can finish.”